The Incident at Mecklenburg
by HRJafael
Summary: Nancy Drew has rarely dealt with murder. She follows clues more like blue envelopes, a wandering amnesiac, and the evidence a twenty year old fire... And the trail of murder that connects if all together.
1. Author

AUTHOR'S NOTE

July 4, 2012 - River Heights University

When I first met Carolyn Keene, I had no idea who she was. I had been invited by my American Literature professor to attend a gala event at the main River Heights U. campus celebrating Independence Day. This American Literature professor had just made me endure a whole semester of dissecting stories and looking for this phantom ghost known as the "American Dream." I succeeded but only after coming to full appreciate what he had come to the college to teach. And since it was Independence Day, what better way to see the "American Dream" than it in celebratory action?

I had no idea that I would bump into a lady, perhaps thirty years my senior, in a pale mauve dress. I came to find out that her name was Carolyn Keene. Needless to say, I was shocked-the Carolyn Keene? The Carolyn Keene who had written over 100 novels featuring a teenage sleuth who I had come to love in my youth? It was her alright. Automatically my fascination grew. I found myself not paying attention to the fireworks but rather to the stories that this woman told. I have come to acknowledge that three authors propelled me forward to become a writer: the first, the Victorian grandfather of detective fiction, Wilkie Collins. His novel, The Woman in White, is still my favorite novel to this day. The second author was the "Queen of Crime" herself-the famous Agatha Christie. Her conundrums featuring the meticulous Hercule Poirot and the village spinster Jane Marple have fascinated and confounded me at the same time.

The third was none other than Carolyn Keene.

Yes, her novels were juvenile, but there was something in the character that she created that got a hold on me. It has now transpired from the novels to the award-winning computer games from HerInteractive based off the novels. I own the best majority of 25 games-and the company is still going strong, if not stronger than ever since they released their first game featuring the teenage sleuth back in 1998.

Because of Carolyn Keene, I fell in love with Nancy Drew.

And, because of my eccentric American Literature professor, I would have never had the opportunity to meet the woman behind her. Carolyn and I became quick friends. The moment that she discovered that I too was a writer, she wanted me to write something for her.

I asked if I could use Nancy.

She said yes.

The rest, dear reader, is history. Here, for the first time, is a novel written for the adults who grew up with the resourceful girl detective. Here is the beginning of what I hope to be an everlasting bond between Carolyn Keene, her creation, and myself. Carolyn was kind enough to read the draft and was delighted by it. She has even requested that I contrive more puzzles for Nancy to solve.

And, of course, how could I say no?

I hope you enjoy this just as must as I enjoyed writing. Happy trails, then!

Ever yours,

H.R. Jafael


	2. CH I

The door-bell jingled behind Florence Havisham as she was about to place an unfamiliar eggshell blue envelope into a tiny pigeon-hole. There were others like it, stacked side to side and on top, up to three levels. Her gentle hand paused in mid-action as her ears perked up at the noise. Already, a frustration showed on her aquiline features. She wanted to turn her head to look at the clock above the front entrance. But, in doing so, she would have to confront whoever had just entered the office.

What time was it anyway? she thought. It can't be seven already-I have too much to do still. Another thought soon came to her: she had forgotten to lock the front entrance after her arrival at six that morning.

That was stupid of me, she almost said out loud. In its place, a sigh. Only a split second had passed since the bell jingled. By now, only a ghost of an jingle's echo resonated in the air, a one-note masterpiece that the late Mr. Havisham had set up years ago. With a wry frown, at both the memory and now this, Florence tried to place the envelope down. Besides, its address was a bit of a conundrum at the moment and she had been having a difficult time putting it in its appropriate place. It would have to wait...

"I'm sorry, sir, but I'm afraid we're not open yet," she said in a secretarial matter-of-fact type of way. She still had her back to the stranger. Resolved, and placing the blue envelope on the counterspace underneath the pigeon-hole boxes, Florence straightened up and flattened up the creases in her plaid dress. After being fashionably satisfied with herself, she promptly turned around to greet the stranger more directly. She had been expecting the usual "early bird" customer-but what met her eyes instead made her take an involuntary step back, subtle and barely noticeable.

The man before her was shabbily dressed in an ill-fitting brown coat, a ragged and moth-eaten scarf, and slouching trousers. He wore a yellowed-white shirt underneath the brown coat, with the shirtsleeves rolled up to just below the elbows. The clothes were ill-fitting not because they were made for someone bigger, but rather for someone smaller. Florence could not see the face clearly since he stood just before the door, the face being masked in the shadow. He stood quite still, tall, and erect with determined broad-shoulders. There was something quite militaristic about him. Neither one spoke for a moment. Florence was tempted to step around the counter had not the stranger simply stepped forward out of the shadows.

Who are you? thought Florence as she gazed at the face. It was a young man with rugged facial features. His hair was disheveled and his eyes hopeful. The young man appeared older with his rust-colored five o'clock shadow, the same color as that wild hair. Something about the shape of the face, its arrangement, its story being etched into the glittering eyes made Florence wonder. There was a wild frontier handsomeness in him. Florence looked further-for a young man, he was well-built, athletic-looking, and aged somewhat prematurely for some reason.

So that was it! The specks of gray and white hairs interspersed in the beard and hair finally caught her attention. Something, she could tell, was weighing down upon him.

"I do apologize, ma'am, but-it's just...well..." For the first time, Florence noticed the baseball cap held in his callous hands. By wringing it, it was soon apparent that the young man was nervous. Nervous of what thought? He looked down for a couple of seconds and then tried again.

"The door was unlocked, you see. I thought you had perhaps opened earlier."

Florence attempted to smile but did not have a convenient mirror at hand to see if she had succeeded. His voice was sharp, insinuatingly educated, and secretly melodious. Her interest in this man piqued.

"It's quite alright-I just forgot to lock it up after I got here earlier to get the store ready for the day-but," Florence eyed the clock above the door and noted that it was quarter til seven, "now that you're here, how can I help you?" She folded her hands before her as a hostess would at a party. Now she could tell she was smiling. The young man stood ever so still that a worry began to form way back in the recesses of Florence's mind. Something wasn't right, she pondered.

The young man seemed to snap out of a trance, gulped, and took another liberal step forward, wringing the baseball cap as he did so. His eyes were nervous but determined about their course. He was a bit uncertain about himself but, at the last second, had pulled himself together to make a bold move.

"Do...?" he began shakily. Another gulp, another intake of breath. With a slight tremor in his nervous voice, the young man asked a question that caused Florence to give out a shocked "Oh!"

"Do...do you know me?" It wasn't the question he asked but in the way he asked it that hit Florence's heart. There, she realized that the young man was sincere-and all-too serious. A bit too much so for her taste. The young man recognized Florence's puzzled expression and stopped wringing the baseball cap. His mouth stood agape as his brow furrowed out of perplexity. The tremor had spread from his voice to his left hand, his only free hand. It was shaking ever so slightly. With its onset, the worry at the back of Florence's mind began to grow.

She attempted to alleviate the ever-increasing tension by answering the young man's question, a task that was all that much easier since she could be completely honest. She cold feel her curiosity itching for more.

"Sorry. I don't recognize you..." Florence paused to take in the young man's reaction-he gave none. "Should I? Did I ever meet you?" she asked nonchalantly. Another quick pause as she waited for her question to sink in. The young man started to wring his baseball cap again-but this time, it was different. Before, he had done it out of a nervous tension-now it seemed to be expelling a frustrated tension from within.

The clock above the entrance now read ten til seven. In ten minutes, Florence would have to go flip the sign to say "OPEN". As of now, the sign, with both "OPEN" and "CLOSED" spelled out in nostalgic cursive, hung on a door-nail above the door-window. Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock. The clock sounded in her head. What are you doing Florrie? You shouldn't be talking. You shouldn't listen to this strang-

"No-at least," the young man mirrored her puzzled expression. "I don't think we have...do-do you mind telling me where I am?" It was at that moment that the worry in Florence's mind fully realized itself. This is a joke. It has to be. Everyone knows where they are.

"That's not always true," Florence said out loud and immediately regretted doing so.

"Excuse me?" was the puzzled stranger's response.

"Oh-where are you? I'm sorry, I was thinking to myself. You're in Mecklenburg, Mr.-?" The last part was meant to act as a prompt for a name-but it was a prompt without result. In fact, it only seemed to have agitated the young man even more.

"Do you know it?" he asked rather suddenly.

"I don't think I understand-"

"Because that's just it," the young man started and let the baseball cap fall to the floor.

"I don't know my name."


	3. CH II

At about seven o'clock in the morning, the sun's rays had not yet reached the park-bench by the children's playground. It still laid in a dusky shadow that inspired creative imaginations. This was how the person, who sat comfortably on the park-bench, liked it. All the merrier, he thought when it came down to covert cooperation. He could use all the help he could get. Already at the man's feet were the pigeons who explicitly got up from their cumbersome nests to feed on the charitable bread crumbs, scattering from the man's all-too eager hand.

The pigeons cooed and the man hummed a lively tune. He didn't know where he had heard the tune but if he was humming it, he must have liked it. Then again, it was all too likely he had composed it himself with the orchestra of his mind. Must come with gifted musicians, he thought as he dipped his hand into a Zip-Loc plastic bag, grabbed a generous handful of bread crumbs mixed of different varieties of bread, and scattered them in a graceful motion in front of him. The pigeons went into an excited fluttering frenzy, cooing all the more as more charitable food was dispensed to them.

How can creatures be so simple? the man considered as he gently nudged a pigeon off one of his patent-leather shoes. Now why couldn't people be more like that? Take away complications, break down life to pure simplicity. Easy to understand-to know-to catch? He continued his humming but with less enthusiasm than before. Why was he in a good mood anyway? Could it have been the news he received only the day before? Perhaps it was that...

Somewhere, in the children's playground, in the general area of the shadows where the swings should be, a sound arose. It was of mulch scraping against a moving body, the feet dragging into the mulch covered in the morning dew.

Or perhaps it was not...

Smiling to himself, the man closed the Zip-Loc plastic bag, and placed it in one of his coat-pockets, should he have need of it again. He sat still to listen to the slowly-approaching body. He could sense the movement behind him, getting nearer and nearer. Come to rattle my cage, have we?

"I'm not much of a believer in ghosts," the man decided to say out loud, just for effect. Instantly, the movement behind him came to an abrupt halt. Ah, so it's you then! thought the man. Amused with the prospects, he let out a loud boisterous laugh before continuing.

"But I am rather fond of an early morning haunt-" Turning to face the perpretator, the man on the park-bench grew more solemn in face and with the words, "isn't that right, Murray?"

"Aye," was the ghostly response he got as an imposing figure stepped forward, out from underneath the trees' shadows. The man on the park-bench, however, didn't seem a bit disposed about him.

"Indeed," he replied back rather flatly and monotously. Turning to face his kingdom of peasant-like pigeons, the man retrieved the bag of bread crumbs and began to feed them once more. The figure behind him began to move around the bench. Seeing that there was yet space for another person to sit, he took that freedom hastily for granted. Not much could be seen of either of the two as the sunlight was still making its way to that point in the park. Neither one spoke but instead they watched intriguely at the pantomime performance that the pigeons gave to their superior spectators. When one of them finally decided to break the silence, it was with an authoritative tone of a tyrant. The man turned his head sharply to his newly-arrived companion.

"You took a liberty, Murray. Never-never...have I seen you sit here. Or asked of you to do so, for that matter." The other man, being obliging and fearful, began to get up.

"Do sit down." A snarl formed on the doting pigeon-feeder's face. All evidences of prior charitable features were gone. It was a dark brooding face, belonging to a man who made you look twice, just to be sure...

Seeing the present snarl, the other man obeyed without the slightest inclination to hesitation. Silence once more, then-

"How is the good doctor, Murray?" Murray sat silent as a statue, thinking, attempting to answer the question in a way that would please his superior. For this superior, he though, was not one for allowing you leniency when you made the smallest of mistakes. You got one chance and one chance only. Anything beyond that was pure mercy from God. I can not blow this, Murray thought. He took a short breath and let it out as fast as possible, as if he wanted to get it over with.

"He's-he's entertaining guests." It was a fact and Murray could only hope that his superior would that into consideration, a feat which was rarely done. The other man didn't answer back immediatel but rather grabbed another handful of bread crumbs. He placed his hand out in front of him as the pigeons gathered below it, waiting and expecting eagerly for the food that was to come.

But it didn't come. Instead, the hand floated above them completely motionless and unwilling. With each passing second, anticipation and discontent grew and grew, slowly driving the pigeons mad, flapping and bumping into each other right at the man's feet. Murray was confused: What on earth is he doing? The other man began to smile-the smile was a little too vicious for Murray's taste.

"You must be wondering what a doting old man like me is doing?" (Murray nodded his head but his nod went unawares)-"Well, it's silly actually. It's an experiment, you see. No, really, it is! You see: I've been feeding these same pigeons for weeks now that they now gotten used to it. They now take it for granted that I will be here at about seven in the morning with my little bag of bread crumbs and feed them... Just look at them! See how they behave! Ha ha! It's amusing, it's silly-nevertheless," the older man paused and said darkly, "they're still vermin. And it's pathetic."

Suddenly, he gripped his hand, crushing the bread crumbs which made the pigeons more annoyingly hungrier.

"It's so simple-_**too simple**_-to give..." The older man paused with a savory suspense, "...and to take away..." There was a brief moment's silence between the two opposing forces. Murray lingered at the saying. There was some dying undertone in what he had just heard that didn't sit well with him.

The old man continued unabated and without so much as a blush of the cheek.

"They've become _dependent_-hooked ever so on the opium I readily give them-_but_ _take that away_..."


	4. CH III

_A window? But how could a window be there?_ There was never a window there! Right before his bed! No-it cannot be-it's in the wrong place. It should be to the side...but there was nothing there. Just more empty space...but it wasn't! Sunlight was pouring in-into _**where**_? And why here?

_And why does my head ache? Make the pounding stop! **STOP!**_


End file.
